Opening music: I’m Dungeons You’re Dragons by the Alligators
Hosted by Ross Payton and Tom Church
Promos: Rpgpodcasts.com and The Tome Podcast
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Synopsis:
Sooner or later, your favorite game is going to become old and tired. The players will read every sourcebook, the GM will run every written adventure for it and what was once new and exciting becomes cliched and tired. How do you make an old game that everyone knows new? We discuss several ways to freshen things up and what to avoid when remixing the game.
Shout Outs:
Viking Fighting: A viking martial arts school. Tactical warhammer classes, anyone?
The Abominable Charles Christopher: A brilliantly drawn and written web comic following the adventures of a simple minded yeti and the other inhabitants of the forest. A must read.
Sluggy Freelance: A mediocre web comic with generic art, below average writing, static characters that haven’t changed in over 10 years and an overly convoluted plot that requires reading the entire 10 year backstory to make sense.
Click below to see Tom meeting Henry Rollins
From left to right: Tom, Henry and Aaron.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 54:58 — 39.5MB)
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Great episode guys!
Tom you do indeed look like a deer in the headlights in that picture.
By the way, to answer Ross’ question regarding whether the PCs in my game actually saved the Duke; the NPC they had rescued who was supposedly a diplomat going to meet the Duke told them to come back and meet her two days later at the merchant’s where they left her, and she would get them an audience.
When they returned she didn’t show up, The merchant’s store-front was closed up as well. Not being easily put off, the rogue in the group decided to break into the place via a second story window in the back and found the merchant dead. They then called the city guard and reported their suspicions. The guards said they would report it and look into the matter.
Still nto satisfied, they went to the temple of Pelor, and the party cleric is a plorian and reported it there as well. Needless to say the assassin never had a chance to get tot he Duke before being warned.
There is still no proff that their travelling companion is the assassin, but they are looking for her still.
Excellent show, very useful to me as a DM/Storyteller. Reminds me of a horror game I ran in nWoD, with the PCs as a group of University students rather than their usual choices (which are often cliches anyway).
Keep up the good stuff, guys!
Another awesome show. The Night on Owlshead Mountain inspired me to get my group into CoC and DG.
Keeping old things new put me in mind of an article I recently ran across from an old Dragon magazine called “The Colour of Magic” by Dan Joyce. The idea was to keep spells the same in terms of stats but to alter the description to spice things up:
This is the key to creating hundreds of new spells to suit any kind of spell-caster: make cosmetic changes to existing spells. Describe spells differently. Magic missile need not be a shimmering arrow. It could be a telekinetic fist, a jet of flame, or a steel pin stuck into a voodoo doll. The game mechanics remain the same. All that changes is how these effects are brought about. Hence, a magic missile variant will still do 2-7 points of damage, with a range of 150′ and a duration of one round. A shield spell still grants a saving throw. As for the rest, use your imagination. Maybe Maximus the Black casts a magic missile by momentarily enchanting his dagger, then making a pass at a distant enemy with it. A cut, doing 2-7 points of damage, opens up on Maximus’ enemy, mirroring the swipe Maximus made with his dagger.
As an aside, I had Henry Rollins in my face years ago when I saw Black Flag. The guys I was with were ragging on his band because thy had long hair (I believe the phrase “hyper hippies on stage!” may have been uttered). Mr. Rollins gave us an earful, I got the brunt of it although I was actually not involved. Kind of a tight spot for me because I wanted to defend myself but also didn’t want to rat out my friends so I just took it and apoligized on their behalf.
Seeing the Rollins Band at the Warfield in S.F. is one of the highlights of my music life. What an intense, but thoughtful man.
Cool photo!